This podcast is a proud affiliate of Libro.fm. By clicking on this banner, we may earn a proceed of any purchases you make, in which case, we thank you very much!

Plot Trysts Reads Mr. Impossible by Loretta Chase

​ [00:00:00]

Katherine Grant: Welcome to the historical romance sampler podcast. I'm your host, Katherine Grant, and each week I introduce you to another amazing historical romance author. My guest reads a little sample of their work, and then we move into a free ranging interview. If you like these episodes, don't forget to subscribe to the historical romance sampler, wherever you listen to podcasts and follow us on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.

Now let's get into this week's episode. Welcome to a very special edition of the Historical Romance Sampler Podcast. I am joined today by none other than Meg and Laine of Plot Trysts. Plot Trysts, if you are not cool enough to know, is an awesome podcast that drops at least two episodes weekly and it's Meg and Laine who are two friends who read romance novels and talk about them publicly [00:01:00] and always have something interesting and sometimes divisive.

to say about the books. So, Meg. Meg and Laine, thank you so much for coming on Historical Romance Sampler.

Meg: Yeah, thank you for having us.

Katherine Grant: So what we're doing on this special episode is you're gonna read a sample of a book that you love and then we will talk about that sample and more generally about historical romance together afterwards.

You're reading Mr. Impossible by Loretta Chase. Is there anything we should know about the book setup before we get into the scene that you're reading?

Meg: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. So I'm, the scene we're reading is actually very close to the end. It's very towards the end of the book. This book is a Regency romance, but it takes place in Egypt.

So it's a, an unconventional setting, I would say, for a book. Historical romance for Regency, especially. And it is, the scene [00:02:00] is from the perspective of the female main character's brother. So one of the things I love about Loretta Chase is the way she uses perspective.

Laine: I was going to ask, how spoilery can we be?

Katherine Grant: I mean, this book has been out for a very long time, so I think it can be pretty spoilery.

Laine: Okay, so just in setting up the context of the scene, Daphne is the heroine of the book, and she is an expert in hieroglyphs, demotic, ancient Egyptian languages, but as a woman, was not able to publish under her own name, so she published under her brother's.

And the conflict of the book is he gets kidnapped and she's trying to find him and she enlists the hero, Rupert, to assist her in finding her brother, who, as you can tell from all of the context, has sort of taken advantage of her. Not like, you know, he's not like the worst brother ever. We've read worse in Regencies, but he's, he has not appreciated her.

And he is benefiting from her skills and that is their relationship [00:03:00] prior to, and obviously give it away, they find the brother. This scene is from the brother's perspective. So they found

Meg: him. This is, this is really towards, this is like honestly the very end. But there's, she does this thing that I really think is super interesting.

The other thing to know about this book is that Rupert is, He's not a cinnamon roll. He's not a golden retriever, but he is a himbo. Like he is, he is the brawn and she is the brains. Like that is the entire setup of this book.

Katherine Grant: Love it. So. Love it. Awesome. Well, take it away whenever you want to.

Meg: All right.

So, so Rupert's starting and he's, he's talking about a time when they were stuck in a, a caved in tunnel in a tomb. He went on to tell that tale while Miles listened, wondering if he'd got drunk again without realizing, because it could not be his sister Daphne, of whom Carsington spoke with so much [00:04:00] enthusiasm and admiration, as though, as though... "you're in love with her," Miles said.

"Then-" he said. Because he hadn't meant to say it aloud. He stared hard at the mongoose. She licked his hand. "In love," Carsing repeated. "In love?" " No, sorry. Don't know what I was thinking. The heat, the shock. Couldn't believe it was my sister you were talking about. Brave and dashing and all that."

Carsington's countenance darkened. "Not but what I expect she'd rise to the occasion," Miles added hastily. He was not afraid of Carsington exactly, yet he had to admit the glare was a trifle daunting. In any event, it wasn't good for the man to become overwrought. Daphne had said so. "My sister is a plucky creature, of course, continuing her work in spite of all the discouragement and so forth."

"You've got it backwards," Carsington said. "It wasn't her rising to the occasion. It's the [00:05:00] occasion rising to her. Egypt and this business with you and the papyrus have finally given her the chance to show what she truly is. She's, she's a goddess, but human. A real goddess, not make believe. She's beautiful and brave and wise and fascinating and dangerous.

As goddesses are, as you know, in all the best stories." "I'll be hanged," Miles said. "You really are in love with her." The black eyes regarded him steadily. Then they regarded the cabin ceiling, then the window. Then they came back to him. "Do you know," Carsington said mildly, "I've been wondering what it was." The end of my

dramatic

reading.

Katherine Grant: I mean, that is such a yummy little vignette of the, like, realizing that you're in love, but not really. Confessing it, protecting from the former protector the goddess declaration, oh my gosh. Laine, what do you think about this passage? [00:06:00]

Laine: I love it because it also incorporates other pieces of the book, like you've got the throwaway reference to the mongoose, but also the way that Rupert confesses everything to Daphne is by saying, I'm so mad you didn't tell me I was in love with you, I had to hear it from your brother.

So there's this call out of like, he was never going to figure it out on his own, and everyone should have known that. And so the fact that it's Miles who ends up being the one to tell him, like, I just love the way it ties the whole book together.

Katherine Grant: That's really interesting. I would find that really annoying if someone was expecting me to tell them that they're in love with me, like, there's an emotional labor there.

That in real life, very unappealing. But in the book

Laine: Sure, but in a book where the brain and brawn dichotomy is so deliberately split, she has to do all the brain.

Katherine Grant: Yeah, yeah, and he trusts her to tell him how he's feeling. And he'll accept that. Yeah, the other thing that was interesting was the like, element of danger [00:07:00] that Rupert was emanating.

Like, he seemed friendly. I haven't read this book, full disclosure. I've read the one with the canals. Yeah. Also a himbo, but where like he's protecting, he's kind of being, you know, he's like angry that Miles hasn't seen Daphne for her worth. And then all of a sudden he's like reduced to the black eyes look around the room and like that is like, oh, like he's, he's being more predatory because Miles hasn't seen her the way he wants her to see him to see.

Laine: Well, and Miles is the one who put her in danger, is also what he's realized at this point. So the fact that she had to be brave and daring and courageous in the face of danger is Miles's fault.

Katherine Grant: Yeah. Yeah. Meg, is there anything from the scene that you want to call out?

Meg: I always like actually when I read romance, when I read just about any book and you see the main character from a third person's perspective, So we have a lot of [00:08:00] Daphne looking at Rupert.

We have a lot of Rupert looking at Daphne. We have a lot of their relationship. They think about each other a lot. And you know how Rupert sees himself and you know how Daphne sees Rupert. But here you see how other people see him. And I really enjoyed it a lot because Another part of the book is that he has this reputation for being the Hellion son of the, the Earl of Hargate.

So that's why he was like kind of sent to Egypt to get him out of the way, right? Yeah. But again, the whole time you see him, like sure, he's a Himbo, but he's very competent and he's very supportive and he's there for Daphne. And so, of course, you see why she falls in love with him. But now you see Miles being like, why would either of them be into the other?

So I really like that.

Katherine Grant: Yeah, that's interesting. We don't often get a third person looking in. You don't often hop into that third person's point of view . It's very dual point of view. You're getting the two love interests and no one else.

Meg: And [00:09:00] she does, so Loretta Chase, at least in this book, she doesn't do head hopping. So you always know, like, whose perspective you're reading the scene from and, you know, you're not going to jump from Miles to Rupert, you know, back to Miles, but she does incorporate those other perspectives. So, like, in this book you also see the, the villain's perspective.

You read from his perspective several times. Which is kind of, kind of fun, you know?

Katherine Grant: Fun, and also I can see how that could be really useful plot wise to just get things going. And you don't have to be like, this is how the heroine guessed what the villain was thinking. Yes.

Meg: Well, it's also nice too, because there, so in this book, there's this element of mystery.

So Daphne and Rupert are on this expedition to find Miles, but the point of the book is not whodunit, right? So this is not a mystery. And it's very clear from the beginning that it's not a mystery, right? Because we know from, I think the third chapter, who the ultimate villain [00:10:00] is. And that's kind of fun too, to see how Daphne interacts with, with the villain, who I'm not, I'm not going to give away for you, but you see how, how, you know what his his ultimate gain is, what he wants to do ultimately, but then you see how... so Rupert resents him from the very beginning, but not because he knows he's the villain, but because he's flirting with Daphne, right?

And so, I don't know, just all the different perspectives sort of on top of each other are really fun.

Katherine Grant: Yeah.

Do you like audiobooks?

How about your local independent bookstore? If your answer to either of those was yes, then you should make sure to check out the official Historical Romance Sampler playlist over on libro. fm. Libro. fm is an online retailer of audiobooks that shares the profits of each sale with local independent bookstores. I've partnered with libro. fm to create an official playlist for the historical romance sampler [00:11:00] season one.

You can purchase the books a la carte, if you just want to read them one at a time, or you can sign up for a monthly membership. And if you sign up for a new membership, be sure to use code HISTORICAL so that you get three extra audiobook credits with your first month. Follow the link in my link tree to check out the playlist and start shopping. And now, back to this week's episode.

 So this is an adventure book, like you said, it's not a mystery, but it's definitely got adventure to it. Do you have a preference for reading historical romances that have high adventure?

Meg: So that, that's a good question. I can answer for Laine here because we, it's not that we need adventure in the book, but we really like it when the main characters are on the same side and on the same page and working together to obtain or to, to get to, to get something, right? So the conflict of the book is not them in conflict with each other, right?

But them trying together [00:12:00] to overcome some conflict.

Laine: I was gonna say the exact same thing. Well, and, so, to be clear, Meg and I bonded over this book because I am a huge sucker for Ancient Egypt in any context, romance or otherwise. And so, I was telling Meg about the series I love that is not a romance series.

She recommended this, and this is how we learned we both loved romance novels. So, while I'd certainly like plenty of romance novels without high adventure, like, yeah, Dashing Archaeologist, especially if it's archaeologist spy in Egypt, is my number one favorite thing of all time.

Katherine Grant: No that makes sense. I have, I have not read very much romance from like the 80s and 90s and a little bit more in the 2000s, but I am I haven't read a lot about it, but I haven't read that many, but I have this sense that particularly the 70s, 80s, there was a lot of [00:13:00] the historical romance had to have adventure.

There were pirate ships. There were, you know, Stolen horses, they were like, they were epic sagas with so much adventure. And so I'm curious, do you feel like there are still these high adventures being delivered in historical romance today?

Laine: I want to defer to Meg, because like you, my context isn't great. Like, I, I, I haven't read very much written, even in the early 2000s, that Meg hasn't put in my hand. But I do think when high adventure appears, my sense from what I've read about the earlier eras is that the women have a lot more agency, that the adventures of the 70s and 80s and 90s were a lot of the man is a swashbuckler and the woman is a damsel in distress.

And so I do think when. There are conflicts like that in more modern romance. It's, it's less passive on the part of the woman, [00:14:00] but I defer to Meg on the rest of your question.

Meg: Yeah, I mean, that's, it's an interesting question. I, so I'm currently reading all of Laura Kinsale's books, which are really fascinating from a plot perspective, because they are just, there's so much plot in those books, right?

Like, so much stuff just happens. There are plenty of books, I think, that, that are quieter and don't have as much adventure. I, I will say that, I think there are, I think there still are authors writing those adventure books, right? There are spy books. There, like Emily Sullivan wrote a whole series with spies with it that we both just absolutely adore.

I think a lot of road trip romances end up veering into adventure territory. Yeah. I will say, so one of the things I do think is I think that a lot of historical romance authors who are writing right now are more aware of the cultural context of the era in which they're writing. And so I think we're less [00:15:00] likely to see someone who's a blockade runner. We're less likely to see pirates because we, we know like what, what the pirates were selling and like what they were smuggling.

So I think that there is a little bit more awareness there. And so we might be less likely to see these things. It's not a sort of epic adventures. For example, like we love Mr. Impossible. It's like, I think it's one of the best romance novels out there, but I've certainly seen legitimate critiques of it that say, well, it's very colonialist, you know it's not problematized at all that, that Rupert and Daphne are in Egypt.

And, and, and so. You know, adventuring up and down and going into tombs and stuff like that. So I think there is a little bit more thought put into, okay, what kind of adventure can they have? And I think they may be a little bit smaller and closer to home because it's a little easier to control for [00:16:00] those circumstances.

Yeah.

Katherine Grant: Yeah. And to not go into the pitfalls of othering these cultures. So, so there's a lot of chatter on the internet these days about how historical romance is dead. And I think we know that's not true because we three are not dead, and we are reading and writing historical romance. Do you have any theories or perspectives on what romance readers who don't read historical romance should do?

Get wrong about historical romance. Like what is keeping them from picking up a historical romance?

Laine: I can tell you I don't think it's the covers

Meg: Yeah, I don't think it's the covers either You know, I have a lot of theories. I'm not an expert on this at all I think one of the things is you used to when you went to the grocery store You went and you would check out, you would see a mass market paperback of historical romance.

So you could just grab one at the supermarket. And I do think traditional publishers are going [00:17:00] more for like that larger size and it's more expensive. If it's, if it's more than 10, you're not going to just grab one and toss it into your basket. You know what I mean? So I think, I honestly think that's part of it.

I think there was a feeling that it was, I don't, I don't want to say disposable, but like mass market paperbacks were supposed to be disposable, right? They were supposed to be, that's why they're called pulp novels. They're, they're pulp paper, you buy it, it's not supposed to be kept forever, even though now, of course, people are collecting step backs and things like that.

But I think, I think that's part of it. I think there's a price point issue, honestly. I think. That a lot of social media doesn't focus on it and to be 100 percent honest with you. I think historical romance is more progressive than contemporary romance so I do think some people who are not as comfortable reading books that have to think about the politics of the era in which they're written.

I think people might be less [00:18:00] comfortable with that. That's just my opinion. I have seen people write posts or write arguments that say, Oh, you might think that historical romance isn't progressive, but guess what? It's really great. And I'm like, well, yeah, but I don't think that the people who aren't reading it are looking for a really, like, diverse progressive genre.

They want to read a book about a billionaire who buys you everything and that's it.

Katherine Grant: Yeah, that's a very interesting take, and it makes me think about how, in historical romance, we understand that the structure of marriage is something that, there wasn't a lot of room around, like if you wanted to have property, or have wealth, or have anything, Well, you couldn't do it on your own.

Hopefully you'd find a husband who'd be generous and nice to you, and then maybe he'd die, and then maybe you could do it on your own. In contemporary America, you don't need to find a partner to be fulfilled in any way except for romantic fulfillment, if [00:19:00] that's what you want. So when we're in historical romance and the stories are centered around finding someone you love and oh, it's going to end up in marriage.

I mean, obviously there are exceptions where it doesn't end up in marriage, but you're still like very much within that structure. You're either doing it or you're not doing it and that has to be part of the plot. That's not like reaffirming this patriarchal structure as good. It's just saying this, these are the limitations you're stuck with.

How are you going to deal with it? But when we are still using that as the main plot for a contemporary romance, in a way, it's actually not problematizing the patriarchy. It's reaffirming the patriarchy. And so it's calling to different readers. Maybe.

Laine: Yeah. Well, and specifically Mr.

Impossible, which is, as you mentioned, very old. She's a widow. And so part of what's textual is, she doesn't need to marry to have economic stability. And to have respect in society. She's, like, in her late [00:20:00] 20s and can make money in her own name. She's not respected because she can't publish her intellectual findings.

But it's got nothing to do with her being a widow. A man's pawn specifically in her personal life, and I think you're right, there's an inherent acknowledgement of that inequity in historicals that contemporaries, I don't like contemporaries, so I like, I'm the wrong one to sort of ask this question to you because I don't understand why people aren't only historical.

But you're right, I think contemporaries don't problematize our society to the extent that historicals are willing to problematize not just their own context, but our society too.

Meg: Yeah. And I think also, I don't think dark romance used to be its own genre. I think the place where you found dark romantic themes was in historical romance.

There was kidnapping, there was piracy, there was, you know, like all these

Katherine Grant: Dubcon.

Meg: Yeah, all these like wild things that would happen. And I think you could I can [00:21:00] still read some of it in a historical context because I'm like, okay, well, you know, this is It's a historical context, so I can kind of distance myself from that.

But when I read it in a contemporary context, for me personally, I'm like, this is too, it's a little too close to home. I'm not interested in reading about a stalker romance. Whereas, I mean, we talked about, we talked about a Cleopas book, what book was it? One of the ones in the Hathaway series with Harry Rutledge.

And we were like, why did he fall in love with her? I was like, if he had only stalked her a little bit, I would like maybe understand. You know, but I was like, why wasn't he watching her from afar? Why wasn't he like, you know, researching her? And so I can do that in this historical context, right? So I think, I honestly think that there are, there are like dark Romance readers, but now they have their own dark genre.

They don't have to go to historical to find that.

Katherine Grant: Well, is there something specific about historical romance that you think just delivers for you differently than any other [00:22:00] genre?

Laine: Meg and I've had this conversation. For me, it's the I don't like reading anything contemporary or too close to contemporary because for me that is like, not escapist at all. Like, I'm too busy rationalizing how I think something would actually happen. So I need something to either be so far in the past or in another world, be it sci fi or fantasy, to actually immerse myself in the text.

Not to say I have never liked a contemporary ever, but on the whole I find them a lot harder to get lost in. Fair.

Meg: Yeah. I mean, that's, that that is definitely part of it for me. I don't know. I'm just not, I, I was talking to someone else about it and I was like, why does a Duke work for me, but a billionaire doesn't work for me, right?

And I'm just not interested in a, in a billionaire romance. I'm like, what did he do to his employees to get there? I mean, Dukes did the same thing. I get it. Like Dukes are also not like ethically amazing people.

Laine: But I refuse to accept

the

concept of an [00:23:00] ethical billionaire where I'm willing to accept an ethical 18th century duke.

Like I'm willing to suspend disbelief for that, but I'm not willing to suspend disbelief for an ethical billionaire.

Meg: But the, the other thing for me that I really like both about historical romance and also about science fiction specifically, is that I think they can take a, an outside view of current society and make you think about it a different way.

So it's something I like about both of those genres.

Katherine Grant: Yeah. For me, I also... you're able to see patterns from your own life on an individual level and also on a societal level. And I don't know, it somehow gives you the distance so that it's not, it's more of like an intellectual exercise.

Yeah. For me, personally.

[Musical Interlude]

So these are like romance rules do you like them or not? Love it or leave it? The protagonists [00:24:00] meet in the first 10 percent of the novel.

Laine: Love Oh, love it. Love it. What's gonna happen if they take longer than that? Is it still a romance? Like, no. No, thank you. First three pages, please.

Meg: Look, there's a, I, I have read like all of Amanda Quick books.

I love her books so much. And literally she has a formula. It works for me. They kiss. In the third chapter. By the third chapter, the protagonist kissed. That's what I want.

Laine: If they haven't met yet, there might be a damn good reason.

I

don't want to read about their separate lives, that's not why I'm in this.

Katherine Grant: Love it or leave it, dual point of view narration?

Laine: Love it.

Meg: Love it.

Katherine Grant: And I think, Meg, you would even at least add multiple. You'd love even more than dual.

Meg: I definitely want both main characters on page. I'm also fine with more, yes.

Laine: Yeah, unless it's like Elizabeth Hoyt style, in which case that's stupid [00:25:00] fucking maid.

Meg: No, I skip Bridget. Every time I read that book.

Laine: Bridget can

go.

Meg: No.

Leave Bridget behind. I told someone that, I told someone that whenever I read Sweetest Scoundrel, so Sweetest Scoundrel is actually one of, this is terrible, one of my favorite books in the Maiden Land series. I love it. It's so much fun.

Such a good book. Elizabeth Hoyt does this thing in that series where she sets up the next book by writing scenes from the characters who are going to be the main characters of the next book. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I'm going to go out on a limb and say most of the time it does not work.

And in sweetest scoundrel. Does not work. Every time it's in Bridget's perspective, I skip. I like skip to the next scene. I have reread this book many, many times. I skip it. Every time.

Laine: She like has straight up forgotten

how much of that book is from Bridget's perspective.

Meg: I was like, Bridget? What are you talking about, Bridget?

Laine: Yes to dual. More than that, [00:26:00] I, I've got some quibbles.

Meg: Depends. You better do it well.

Katherine Grant: I similarly, I, I honestly, I would on my first read start skipping those perspectives. As soon as I, like, pick up that it's not actually, moving the plot forward and it's just for series service, I'd be like, no, I'm not reading that.

So I,

Laine: I respect that choice.

Katherine Grant: Love it or leave it? Third person, past tense narration.

Laine: Love it.

Meg: Love it.

Don't give me a first person.

Laine: It reads like a teenage girl's diary, which is really weird when it's like a 35 year old dude.

Meg: That's why they're all, they're single perspective, first person, present tense, single perspective.

I'm not, I just can't.

Not saying I have never liked a book with first person present tense. Because when I do, I'm like, what did I just say?

Katherine Grant: There's a famous quote by Jonathan Franzen, about how you should only [00:27:00] use first person. if you can really justify that it is that character's very specific voice. Like, you can't just use a generic first person. And when I first heard that, I was like, okay, stuck up literary author, but I have come to really agree with him.

Meg: I, I agree with him. I agree with him a hundred percent. I hate it when I'm, so I just said that I, like, my number one hate is a single POV, first person present tense. However, if you give me a dual perspective first person present tense and I can't tell them apart, I hate it even more.

Katherine Grant: Yes. Okay. Love it or leave it? The third act, break up or dark moment.

Meg: So the breakup, I can leave it. Dark moment, you need to have a moment where it's dark. You don't know how they're going to work it out, right? So dark moment is fine with me, but breakup, I can leave it. Like in Mr. Impossible, I'm going to spoil it guys, but [00:28:00] what happens is she thinks he gets shot and gets eaten by crocodiles and they get separated.

So, Yeah, break up .

Laine: It's fine. I don't know what you mean by dark moment. Sure. I'm fine with the conflict continuing into third act, but I would like it if my main characters are still true to each other and sure of each other. Thank you so much.

Katherine Grant: The dark moment is usually the relationship is in peril, so in your example, it's in peril because she believes he's been killed by an alligator or crocodile.

Meg: Well, like, he also, he, he asked her to marry him, and she says no, like, that could be the dark moment, too. So, like, that's, there, there has to be a relationship conflict, right?

Katherine Grant: Yeah. You have to doubt that they're gonna end up together. Right.

Meg: You're like, how are they gonna end up together? But

Katherine Grant: Okay. Alright, okay.

Love it or leave it? Always end with an epilogue.

Laine: Leave it. You can leave it.

Meg: I, I don't, I mean, good either way.

Laine: Yeah, I'm, [00:29:00] I'm actually a little over the pro forma epilogue. Like, if you're not actually adding anything, if there's nothing I wanted to see come to fruition, like, leave it behind.

Meg: If there's a sex scene in the epilogue, and it's not about having kids, Laine's fine with it.

Laine: I'm not saying I've never, like, if they've, I don't know, if the whole book is about whether or not she's gonna get to found a company and the epilogue is her and her president's office or whatever, great, like, I'm, I want to see what the characters want to come to fruition, but when the epilogue is just, like, three weeks later, a normal morning at home, I'm like, this did not need to be here, like, epilogues should not be the default, like, use them when they

Meg: But I want them, I want it to be, look, I like epilogues, they're fine, but I want them to be good.

I just read one of my most favorite romance novels. I skipped the epilogue because I hate it. Name names, Meg. It's For My Lady's Heart, and the epilogue has neither of the main characters in it, so I'm like, no,

Katherine Grant: That's not an epilogue, that's a new story.

Meg: Correct. I was like, no thanks, I'm, I'm good. [00:30:00]

Katherine Grant: All right. Love it or leave it? Always read the author's note.

Laine: Leave it! Those exist?

Meg: I like it. I love it. I don't need it, but I, I, I enjoy them when they're there.

Katherine Grant: All right, I usually ask authors, are there other romance rules that they break? Are there romance rules you wish were broken more?

Laine: I want more heroines who are open about having sex with other people.

Katherine Grant: Like,

at the same time in the relationship, or previous to the relationship?

Laine: Previous to the relationship, but like, on the page textually. Like, no, not cheating. Like, I'm not saying I want there to be more cheating in romance, but I do feel like even as the virginal heroine trope has been more and more done away with, there's still an aversion to like, heroines who have had previous [00:31:00] positive sexual experiences, especially with non dead husbands.

I can, more of that would be great.

Meg: We already talked about how we really like, like I really, really like when they're on the same page. I personally I don't like love enemies to lovers. It's just not that interesting to me.

I want to see them working together and being together more. So I don't know if it's a rule, but it's just something that I, that I prefer.

Katherine Grant: Awesome. Well, thank you for playing Love It or Leave It and sharing your hot takes. Fresh takes.

Meg: It's super, yeah. Steamy.

Katherine Grant: So, Plot Trysts, you have New episodes every Monday and Thursday of your traditional podcast.

And then Meg, I know you have all these other projects going on, like a Laura Kinsale reading project with Alexandra Vasti. So where should our listeners go to find you and get up [00:32:00] on the podcast?

Meg: I mean, you could just search for Plot Trysts and it will come up. We have a WordPress site. So Plot Trysts. wordpress. com can also find us on Instagram at Plot Trysts. But, like, honestly, goodreads slash Plot Trysts, we, we managed to, to get the Plot Trysts name. So we're, we're good. If you search for Plot Trysts, then you will find the Kinsale podcast, and there's a discord on there. Also, if you love science fiction, I did a project about Lois McMaster Bujold, which was really great. There's a discord there, so you can join the discord as well.

Katherine Grant: So if you're listening to this podcast, you're on a podcast app. So all you have to do is look for Plot Trysts.

I will also put a link in the show notes to make it really easy for listeners. Please check out Meg and Laine's podcast. They are amazing. And thank you, Meg and Laine, for coming on Historical Romance Sampler.

Laine: Thank you so much for having us.

That's it for this week! Don't forget to subscribe to the Historical Romance Sampler wherever you [00:33:00] listen, and follow us on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. Until next week, happy reading!

​